New Footage Friday: CMLL Juicio Final 12/2/95

Parts of this show have flickered on and off on the internet over the years, but we get the three big matches all in one place so we can write about them!

El Dandy/La Fiera vs. Blue Panther/Fuerza Guerrera 

PAS: My dream version of this match has Panther and Dandy getting a long chance to work the mat, and then building to a climax. This wasn't that, much more a traditional rudo vs. technico brawl, with the rudos bloodying Dandy and the technicos making fiery comebacks. These are four all-timers, so that kind of traditional lucha brawl is going to be elevated when it's El Dandy throwing the big shots. Pretty intense match from the start, so we don't get much shtick from Fuerza, although there is a great moment of him celebrating a spin kick, only to get enzigiried while he is raising his hands in glory. Fiera hits his beautiful over the top tope, Panther and Fuerza get their mask ripped and we end up in a technico triumph. Very enjoyable stuff, although maybe not the classic it looks like on paper.

MD:  This was technically for the Mexican National Tag Team Titles and was supposed to be Juvi with his dad but they had a falling out and it became this instead. No one's going to complain about Panther being in there. After some immediate, still wearing ring jackets, tecnico fire, this got to the beatdown quickly with Fiera accidentally hitting the spin kick on Dandy and then getting reversed right into Panther's feet in a great spot. Dandy bled shortly thereafter with a shot into the post. Panther went right to biting the wound to set the mood (with Fuerza being Fuerza and fouling Fiera simultaneously, also setting the mood). They had some fun tandem offense, like an elevated faceplant and working together to toss Dandy off the top by his hair. The mid-90s Panther who hangs out with Fuerza and bites a guy in the head and poses and stooges freely (the big transition was Dandy ducking a shot and Panther running into Fiera's foot on the outside and selling it like he got his jaw dislocated) is one of my favorite versions of the guy; what range, right? The tecnico revenge had everything you'd want: the image of bloody Dandy standing over Panther and ripping his mask, Dandy's punches, Fiera's spin kick, one guy setting the other up for offense including a huge Dandy smack on the side of the ring, people fouling Fuerza, etc. before rolling into some really fun match up moments and spots for the finish.


El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas -EPIC

PAS: This has to be in contention for the best in-ring series in wrestling history, so when I get to see a new one it is a mitzvah. We get an entire first fall of matwork and it is brilliant stuff, lots of twisting and reversing leglocks and armlock, they do a really cool section based on a top wristlock, Santo has his signature headscissors counter and wins the first fall with a facebuster into a sick armlock for the tap. Absolutely top tier mat work, two perfect grapplers at the top of their game. Casas works the neck in the segunda with a pair of nasty neckbreakers and a seated torture rack for the win. Third fall remained in the ring, remained primarily a grappling battle, there was a ton of little cool moments, things that Negro Casas brings to a wrestling match. There is a point where Santo tries to snap mare Casas, 999 of a 1000 times that is a throw away transition move, but here Casas uses a wide base to block the snap mare twice before Santo is able to power him over. So cool, and an example of the high end brilliance of both guys. This was a less complete match then some of their other super classics, this was all scientific and wrestling based, this is one of the only Santo matches I can remember seeing with out any of his signature dives, and we never got into the violence that both guys can bring, but the tune they did play was perfect. 

MD: Straight title match between the two. Casas escalated things with an elbow drop out of nowhere and some strikes in the segunda to answer the end of the first fall but otherwise, this was relatively clean. Unsurprisingly, it was really good too. I loved all of the little bits of maneuvering for leg grapevines and reversals in the primera. Casas whipped these double arm flips throughout, one leading to the tercera's finish but another setting up a cool little reverse monkey flip early on. One of the best truths in wrestling is that you'll almost always see something new in a Casas match. Here, for me, it was him using his knee jammed hard into Santo's back to escape the bridging cross-footed (Mascaras) headscissors. Santo's seated arm driver into a armbar ended the primera and it's such an underrated move. You always kind of forget he has it until he uses it. They turned up the speed for the tercera and I could have maybe used one or two more near-falls, but the Casita not ending things was a shocking enough moment to make up for it. Post-match there were challenges, but nothing would come of that for another couple of years.


Bestia Salvaje vs. Satanico vs. Hector Garza

MD: We come in with Bestia taking a huge bump into the post. It's a matter of time after that, with Satanico beating him around the ring until he got a little bit of hope but missed a somersault senton and got tied up in the Knot. Garza vs Satanico was a nice little preview of the singles apuestas match to come. Satanico was sure to get all of his advantages off of Garza missing moves due to youthful exuberance. There was a nice hope spot int here where Garza kicked him out of the ring on a Knot attempt and then hit a dive, but he kept missing his follow-ups The third or fourth time Satanico ducks a move, he faked the foul as well and the place comes unglued as it the ref fell for it. Bestia vs Garza gives Hector a surprise nearfall to start, but he's quickly fouled leading to an extended bloody high stakes beatdown. Bestia bleeds even better on the comeback, with some scrapping preceding Garza getting in all of his big dives. This fell apart just a little towards the end with Garza looking hesitant or lost at times, but the crowd went up for the finish and ultimately the match did its job. Garza came out of it with a big win and looking like he had a shot to defeat Satanico two weeks later and save his hair, but maybe not a very big one. If nothing else, Bestia got a well deserved payday.

PAS: The Satanico parts of this match are nice little aperitifs for a bloody banquet of a main event. It was worked as a sprint, and a great one. Both guys are opened up and you would expect and this was a showcase for Bestia's world beating offense. He hits a tope which was more like a flying lariat to the floor and a senton splash which was Togoesque. Garze seems a bit green at this point, but had some really big moments of his own including his corkscrew plancha and a quebrada which totally brained Bestia. Maybe could have used a couple more minutes to milk drama a bit, but this was a heck of a showdown, and a great chance to see two under appreciated greats get a big showcase moment. 

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE RIVALS 

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Mini Complete and Accurate RIVALS: Teddy Hart vs. Homicide

One of the craziest feuds in the 21st Century, every time these two stepped into the ring with each other it felt like an out of control, dangerous bar fight, the kind of fight where someone might lose an eye. It reached a level of danger that few wrestling matches ever do. JAPW isn't as widely distributed as much of the great indy wrestling of the last 15 years or so, so this feud fell a bit under the radar.

2004

Homicide/B-Boy vs. Teddy Hart/Jack Evans - JAPW 10/30/04 EPIC

2018

Homicide vs. Dezmond Xavier vs. BLK Jeez vs. Teddy Hart JAPW 2/24/18 - GREAT

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Santo and Casas Keep Themselves Depleting Their Spiritual Wealth

El Hijo Del Santo/Bestia Salvaje vs. Super Astro/Negro Casas CMLL Japan 2/1997 - EPIC

PAS: Fukenmania on youtube has been uploading a ton of previously unseen CMLL Japan matches, and this is the crown jewel. Rudo Santo is so much fun to watch. His character is naturally arrogant, he is the son of a saint after all, and I loved how he weaves that arrogance into the match. He is perfectly willing to show off his technical skills, but if he gets one upped or challenged he turns vicious and starts stomping heads. I loved how he just viciously and contemptuously chucks Astro face first into the mat after submitting him with the Caballo. We get some great unusual matchups, I am not sure how many times Super Astro and Santo wrestled each other but it would have to be in single digits, and they have some pretty graceful exchanges and then it gets unfriendly.  Casas versus Bestia is really great too there are both such nasty brawlers and they just throw hands with speed and viciousness. I love the way Bestia throws a clothesline, he just clubs someone right in the side of their neck.  So happy this showed up.

MD: This was an amazing find, just a great hybrid of lucha-in-Japan spots and pure, visceral hatred from four great luchadors. I'm not sure what Lucha Fiesta 97 was but they wrestle this match in Korakuen Hall like it was a huge deal, putting as much effort into this as something you'd see on a huge CMLL show in Arena Mexico. While it still had that flair that you get from high end lucha touring in Japan, everything still had extra oomph to it, extra meanness. Casas' clotheslines were huge. I loved his rapid fire elbows to the skull (instead of a ten punch) in the corner. Super Astro was killing people left and right, tossing them into chairs, crowning them with chairs, putting more into a springboard twisting senton or just the leap back headbutt than I've ever seen out of him before, just crushing people with his tope. I've rarely seen Santo so mean either, putting in an extra stomp whenever he could. The sheer swagger he had in locking in the Caballo was just rudo perfection. The Casas vs Santo stuff was even better than you'd expect, given the setting, just dripping with hatred and the spirit of competition. Maybe it wasn't as big as in some matches due to the setting, but the actual work was exceptional and gritty as hell. Even early on, they worked stuff you've seen a hundred times just a bit sharper and rougher, be it Santo's cross-legged headscissors or just an extended front facelock exchange. It wasn't just the two of them either. All four made things look gritty and mean that you just take for granted as light and airy (like that back headbutt from Super Astro that usually looks downright dainty). The dive train was nuts. There were so many little throw away spots and bumps that almost got lost in the intensity of this. They almost killed Casas on a double back body drop for instance. The selling was there (including some heat on Casas; the crowd started even but learned very quickly to boo Santo), with them making use of the tag format to break up pins/holds. There were moments where it meandered but I didn't care because it was meandering with them all trying to beat each other to a pulp. All that and the pure novelty of rudo Santito falling for Super Astro's fakeout antics (early on, before escalation, right at the spot of the match where it belonged). Incredible find.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE SANTO VS. CASAS

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ALL TIME MOTY LIST Head to Head 1998: Hotta vs. Kandori VS. Atlantis/Niebla/Casas vs. Santo/Panther/Warrior

Atlantis/Mr. Niebla/Negro Casas vs. El Hijo del Santo/Blue Panther/Black Warrior CMLL 4/24/98

PAS: Pretty much a perfect lucha trios, it has everything beautiful and great about lucha libre wrapped up in three caidas. Traditionally primera caidas in lucha matches are battles of skill, and we get some all time great match ups in the first fall. We open up with Niebla and Warrior squaring off, in a match full of all timers, these two are the outliers. They kind of remind me of that lost group of 90s basketball players who seemed poised to take over for Jordan, Barkley and Hakeem but failed to live up to their potential. Niebla vs Black Warrior is basically Shawn Kemp trying to dunk over Derrick Coleman. Really smooth counter wrestling with some real moments of athletic explosion, prime Niebla's movement was pretty breathtaking. The Primera Caida also gives up Blue Panther grappling with Atlantis and Negro Casas and Santo, which are just legendary and both pairings look amazing. Man did I loved the finish of this fall, with Panther doing a Backlund lift on Casas and Santo just blasting him with a top rope dropkick, and Warrior cleaning out Niebla with his awesome tope. Segunda Caida is quick and more high impact and includes a great assisted Niebla tope con hilo. Tercera Caida gets nice and grimy Santo and Panther beat the bricks off of Casas, the running kicks to the face here are as nasty as in their all time classic the year before, and Panther is throwing some brutal punches. It is a Satanico level rudo beatdown from two guys you don't think of as that kind of asskicker (Warrior is around too, but on the periphery.) I loved the fuck off finish of this too, with Panther just ripping off Atlantis mask and parading around with it, totally unconcerned about losing the match. I don't remember ever seeing this match before, and it as an all timer.

ER: There's just something about a well executed lucha trios, and this just has a great vibe. You get rudo Santo, tecnico Casas, rudo Panther, slender and ridiculously athletic Niebla, Warrior showing all that promise that he continued showing into the early 2000s, just a great cast. Santo and Panther as rudos is always so good, Santo really lays in nasty strikes, and his tecnico work is rarely about strikes. But rudo Santo is always throwing big slaps, clubbing the back, kneelifts to eye sockets; Panther working rudo maestro matwork always has differences from his tecnico matwork, always being the aggressor instead of working reversals. Everybody gets something to do here. 

Niebla as Shawn Kemp is really about as accurate a simile as you can get, a young hyped athlete who delivers as promised...until he keeps getting fatter and keeps dealing with more and more off work hours problems; in lucha he reminds me of Bestia Salvaje, someone who you see young and is just incredible with his movement, and even older and chubbier is still capable of bringing it, but also capable of dogging it. His movement here is so graceful and yet so impactful, it's wild to see how agile he was working in and bouncing off of the ropes, and that backdrop into a tope con hilo was breathtaking. Warrior was a real fast moving, violent luchador when on, one of the guys I watched a lot from 1998-2001 (before he looked like he was playing an evil resort maitre d), and for a guy with a long history of violent bullet topes, I still flipped for him sending Niebla into the crowd with one. Casas is a great tecnico, and in the tercera two legends give that great tecnico a nasty rudo beatdown, and Panther diving in for the "save" at the end to yank Atlantis' mask off (the one he loosened earlier during a beating) was a great dickhead rudo move, not giving the tecnicos the opportunity to get a clean pinfall victory. It was like diving to knock an ice cream cone out of a child's hand.

Kandori vs. Hotta review

Verdict:

PAS: Man this is tough, I absolutely love Hotta vs. Kandori, that kind of visceral Puro war is right up my alley and kind of a dead artform. However lucha libre at its best is the best, and this has so many awesome moments, and all time great at their height I think I am going with the trios match by a hair.

ER: I've definitely not seen this match before, and it was a great leap back to when I first started watching lucha, and while I hadn't seen this match it's pretty easy to figure out why I immediately got into lucha and have stuck around for 20 years. That being said, I think I'm still edging towards Kandori/Hotta, not by much, but I loved the focus and the blood and the mistake capitalization, with the violence. I'd happily watch both of these matches tomorrow, but at the moment I'm saying the champ retains.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE SANTO VS. CASAS

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Santo and Casas Close Like Bethlehem and Nazareth

El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas CMLL 11/25/95 - GREAT

This is a HH from the LA Sports Arena and a stellar example of the beautiful music these two can play with each other. I loved the knuckle lock monkey flip spots, which they always pull of flawlessly. Santo does his awesome headscissors counters too, which are always great. We get Santo's beautiful tope which Negro takes right into the chairs. This felt like very much a Santo match, with Casas more in the role of rudo base, he is incredible at that role, but I like it when he is a bit more front and center. Match was really chugging along, but I am not sure the low blow finish really worked for me. It is classic rudoism, but didn't feel like it belonged to the same match I was watching, otherwise this was a really great example of their magic with each other.

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Mini Complete and Accurate RIVALS: Negro Casas vs. El Hijo Del Santo

Our buddy Rob Bihari is killing it lately, and as part of his uploads he has thrown up a couple of rare Santo vs. Casas matches, so I figured I would watch and review all of their legendary series.

1987

El Hijo Del Santo/Eddie Guerrero vs. Blue Panther/Negro Casas Juarez 1987 - EPIC

1995

El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas CMLL 11/25/95 - GREAT

1997

El Hijo Del Santo/Bestia Salvaje vs. Super Astro/Negro Casas CMLL Japan 2/1997 - EPIC
El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas CMLL Japan 2/6/97 - GREAT
El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas CMLL 9/19/97 - EPIC

1998

El Hijo Del Santo/Blue Panther/Black Warrior vs. Negro Casas/Atlantis/Mr. Niebla 4/24/98 - EPIC

??

El Hijo Del Santo/Mr. Atlas/Porthos vs. Negro Casas/Willy Cortez/Tahoma Kid-EPIC

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Rey and Psicosis are Playing MC's Like an Old Accordian

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis AAA 3/15/96 - GREAT

Cool hidden gem, as we get a handheld of a AAA spot show. With the hubris of youth both guys pretty much keep the pedal mashed down. We do get to see some matwork early, I especially liked Psicosis's reversal of a tapatia. Finish of the first fall was a little abrupt though as Psicosis just got done with the mat work, picked Rey up, hit a rana off the top, hung him in the ropes, legdropped him and tapped him with a sharpshooter, felt like they just wanted to move on. Otherwise the pacing in this match was good, we got a couple of big dives for a house show including a quebrada into some chairs, and a baseball slide headscissors. Really liked the finish of the tercera as Psicosis was rolling but just gets caught with a flash rana for the pin, really established Rey as a guy who can catch you out of nowhere.

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis WCW 7/27/96 - GREAT

These syndie matches between the two are just like popcorn, disposable, delicious and easy to binge on. This was relatively early in Rey's run, and this was pretty much a Rey showcase against maybe his best base ever. It is a trip to watch early feather light Rey, when you are used to current solid Rey. He moves so fast in this match and the timing of his headscissors are just great. We don't see anything super nuts, although he does hit a flipping senton on that weird elevated WCW Pro stage. Psic hits a couple of nice powerbombs, but is mostly there to make Rey look good.

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Mini Complete and Accurate RIVALS: Psicosis vs. Rey Mysterio Jr.

Our old friend Rob Bihari has been on an uploading frenzy lately, and has put up some pretty rare lucha gems, including some Rey v. Psicosis matches I don't remember seeing. With the addition of lots of WCW Syndie stuff available on youtube, I figured I would take a look at all of their of available matches against each other.


1996

Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis AAA 3/15/96 - GREAT
Rey Mysterio Jr./Konan vs Psicosis/Damien 666 AAA 7/5/96 - GREAT
Rey Mysterio Jr. vs. Psicosis WCW 7/27/96 - GREAT

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